


With a Voice as Big as the Sea

by BroadwayBaggins



Category: Mercy Street (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Christmas, Christmas Caroling, Christmas Cookies, Christmas Sweaters, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-17
Updated: 2016-12-17
Packaged: 2018-09-09 06:29:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,793
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8879521
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BroadwayBaggins/pseuds/BroadwayBaggins
Summary: Jed usually dreads the hospital's annual caroling night, but with Mary by his side, perhaps this year will be different.





	

The annual caroling event was the highlight of the hospital’s winter season and a continual thorn in Jed’s side. It wasn’t as if he hated the holiday or the songs--yes, they could be sentimental and overly sappy, but some were actually quite beautiful and he had a fairly decent voice, (not that he liked to brag about it). It wasn’t even really the fact that he and his coworkers were forced to trade a rare night off in order to go parading throughout the halls, singing carols and distributing candy canes to those able and willing to eat the sugary treats. No, it was the whole production of it that Jed hated, the required Christmas sweaters (the more garish, the better, at least if you were Byron Hale) and Santa hats, the inevitable traffic jams in the already crowded hospital corridors, the dread of staving off the inevitable requests for the more atrocious Christmas carols in the songbook (Jed is still traumatized from last year’s rendition of “Christmas Don’t Be Late,” complete with helium-induced chipmunk voices, that had come about between Hale and some of his cronies and way too much apres-caroling eggnog. This year, he had even more to grumble about--they were adding a new element to the caroling festivities, a “concert” of sorts after the jaunts through the halls were over. The idea was that those who were able to leave their rooms could gather in the hospital cafeteria and enjoy their music there, along with cookies and hot chocolate. It was a nice sentiment, Jed supposed, but when Emma Green the Jolly Hospital Elf had come up with the idea to make the concert segment _prepared_ performances, Jed had lost all of his feigned enthusiasm for the whole endeavor. Hallway caroling he could do. That was spontaneous and no-pressure. Prepared performances, on the other hand...

But his new wife was excited about the idea, and Jed was determined to give Mary a wonderful first Christmas together, despite the still-frosty reception from his family. Originally he had asked Mary if she wanted to perform their piece together--he had visions of a sweet duet of “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” or maybe even “Baby It’s Cold Outside” if they were feeling adventurous, but Mary had kissed him and apologized and said Emma had already claimed her. Sam and Charlotte were working on a piece together, and it would be a cold day in hell before Jed Foster asked Byron Hale for help with anything. So Jed had been forced to work on his own for the concert, with Mary adorably refusing to tell him anything of her own performance. It was a secret, she said.

“You’re lucky I love you,” Jed responded every time.

“I know,” she would say, and kissed him until he forgot all about caroling.

The night arrived despite Jed’s wishing for a freak snowstorm that would paralyze the greater DC metro area and cancel the event (Mary teased him for obsessively checking for cancellations on his phone, even though the forecast didn’t call for anything stronger than flurries that night. Mary looked beautiful in a sparkly black skirt, thick black tights embroidered with snowflakes, and a deep red sweater sporting a Christmas tree and leaping reindeer. He had no idea where she’d gotten such a creation, and she didn’t volunteer. Jed’s sweater was blue, more Alpine in design with snowflakes dotted all over it, and he had chosen it under duress only after Mary had shot down his original idea, which had been a Star Wars Christmas sweater he had found online. “You look beautiful,” he told her as she zipped up her boots. “Sort of a sexy Mrs. Claus vibe going on.” His hands found her hips, bringing her closer against him. “We could lie and say we’re sick.”

Mary chuckled and kissed him once before pushing him away. “We were fine this morning at work. They’d know something is up. Besides, the girls need my voice.”

“The girls? I thought it was just you and Emma.”

“It’s a surprise!”

To Jed’s relief, the first round of caroling, through the halls of the hospital, went well. They ran through all the classics, “Sleigh Bells” to “Silent Night” and everything in between, and the look on the faces of the patients who came to their doors to watch and listen made it all worthwhile (this despite the fact that he and Mary had been put into different caroling groups, and he had been forced to wander the halls with both Byron and Anne, in matching hideous sweaters). Someone had had the idea to dim the lights in the halls, and the carolers sang with electric candles in their hands, a surprising but inspired choice that made the whole night seem magical in a way it never quite had before. Jed sang out with the best of them, even harmonizing with Samuel on “O Christmas Tree”, and for the first time in his memory, he was a bit saddened when the first part of the caroling event was over.

They had a brief window of time to set up the cafeteria for the concert, and the next thirty minutes passed in a blur of assembling rows of chairs and setting out tray after tray of Christmas cookies. The Green family had either spent a whole week baking, or else bought out some catering company’s entire stock, but either way they were the best damn gingerbread cookies Jed had ever tasted. Mary’s contribution, cookies with white chocolate and orange zest that she called “White Chip Dream Cookies” were to die for as well, and he told her as such as they passed like ships in the night, him lugging more chairs and her carefully toting along the hot chocolate. She laughed and told him to save some cookies for the audience.

They arrived in a trickle but right on time, ranging in age from ninety-seven to six months old, some sporting masks to prevent germs and others being pushed in wheelchairs by orderlies. Every patient who was able to leave their room, it seemed, was there, even some who Jed had already seen earlier in the halls. He spotted a few of his own patients and waved at them, shook hands with some family members he recognized from frequent visits, and took his seat as the lights flickered to get the crowd’s attention. Emma Green stepped up to the mic to thank them all for coming tonight, assured them they were in for a treat, and to please help themselves to cookies and hot cocoa!

To Jed’s surprise, Bridget Brannon stepped forward first, singing an old carol in Irish Gaelic accompanied by Henry Hopkins on piano. Jed didn’t understand a word, but found himself drawn into the song anyway. When she was done, Hopkins stayed onstage to duet with Sam Diggs on “Silent Night”, a beautiful piece that had more than one female audience member, staff and patients alike, staring up at the two men in awe. Jed had heard Samuel sing before, but the chaplain’s voice was a surprise--not perfect, but any means, but nice all the same. As they left the makeshift stage, Jed caught a glimpse of Emma Green looking at Hopkins as if he had hung the moon.

Anne Hastings was next, singing a version of Santa Baby that was probably bordering on the indecent, but the crowd ate it up anyway. Emma’s parents made a rare appearance, doing a decent rendition of “Silver Bells” and disappearing into the crowd, no doubt to collect donations from any family members of patients who were feeling particularly generous. Lisette, a new surgery fellow from Paris, surprised them all by doing not a song, but a dance, dusting off her years of ballet training to delight them all with the Dance of the Sugarplum Fairies. Hale debuted his rendition of “Mary Did You Know?”--a bit too much showing off for Jed’s liking, but it drew a tear from more than one eye in the crowd.

“I have to follow that?” he whined in Mary’s ear.

“You’ll do great,” she assured him. 

He turned to plead with her. “Are you sure you and Emma don’t want to switch--”

“Jed, go, you’re up!”

On somewhat shaky legs, Jed made his way up onto the stage. He had enlisted Henry to be his accompanist as well, and the chaplain gave him a thumbs-up before starting the introduction of his song.

Jed took a deep breath, found his wife in the sea of faces, and began.

_“Chestnuts roasting on an open fire,  
Jack Frost nipping at your nose...”_

Luckily for Jed, the song was short and the crowd forgiving. He took a little bow and quickly returned to Mary’s side, and she threw her arms around him, kissing him and praising him for how well he had done. Several echoed her sentiments, and Jed was forced to concede the fact that maybe he had not done as terribly as he feared.

Mary stood up at last, following Emma, Charlotte, and Isabella onto the stage. This, then, was what his wife had meant by “the girls.” Jed’s curiosity grew as the four women lined up, and Isabella produced a guitar, looking for all the world like a modern day Maria Von Trapp. She strummed a few times to get them all in tune, and then Charlotte began to sing.

_“Said the night wind to the little lamb...”_

Charlotte’s voice was beautiful, exquisite even--there was no other word for it. Jed knew she had studied music before turning to medicine, but he had no idea she was this good.

_“Do you see what I see?”  
_

_“Do you see what I see?”_ the other women responded in perfect three-part harmony--Isabella taking the soprano line, Emma the mezzo, and Mary the alto.

_“Way up in the sky, little lamb...”_

They continued this way, each singer taking her own verse in the call-and-response song. Isabella went next, singing about the little lamb and the shepherd boy, then Emma took the verse in which the boy speaks to the king, and then, finally, it was Mary’s turn to shine as the king addressing the people. Her voice was different than the others, lower with an almost jazzy lilt, and Jed was so proud of her he was on his feet before the song had even ended.

_“The child, the child, sleeping in the night,_  
he will bring us goodness and light,  


_He will bring us goodness and light!”_

Emma, Charlote, and Isabella chimed in on the final lyric, and the crowd burst into cheers and applause, Jed’s the loudest of all.

Maybe, he thought, caroling night wasn’t so bad after all.

**Author's Note:**

> Yay Christmas caroling! I went modern with this piece, as I think everyone else did XD This is the same verse as my piece "Where The Lovelight Gleams", in which Mary and Jed are newlyweds. I wanted to fit as many characters into this as I could, and I hope you like it! I know we haven't really met Lisette or Charlotte yet, but I couldn't resist the idea of a French ballerina, and Charlotte is played by Tony award winning Patina Miller so I thought it would be a shame not to showcase her voice! The idea of the quartet comes from an instagram video Mary Elizabeth Winstead posted during filming, with her and Tara Summers and Hannah James and Emily Marie Palmer singing between takes. Emily, who plays Isabella, had a guitar. I have swapped out Charlotte for Anne in this but hopefully no one will mind!
> 
> Mary's White Chip Dream Cookies do exist, and are a staple of my Christmas each year. Title comes from "Do You Hear What I Hear?"


End file.
